A NEWSLETTER FOR THE MEMBERS OF THE GREENWOOD CHURCH OF CHRIST

VOLUME 2 NO. 43                                        December 11, 2005

CAN I IMPROVE (Part 1)

STEVE NIEMEIER

Daniel 5:22-31 tells the story of Belshazzar who was weighed in the balances and found wanting according to verse 27 of that passage.  Verse 22 tells us that he had not humbled his heart and therefore the question comes to me “have I humbled my heart” to God (James 4:10)?  Humbling myself to God would allow me to answer the question of “can I improve” with a resounding “yes”.

The Psalmist in Psalm 85:6 states, “Will You not revive us again, that your people may rejoice in You?”  As we close out this year and start thinking about a new year shouldn't we humble ourselves by examining where we are in our work of the Lord and revive ourselves to do His will?  All of us need to improve in one way or another and by performing a self-examination we should be able to find the things that we should improve.

We need to strive to increase our spiritual-mindedness.  Philippians 4:8 gives us guidelines of what we are to meditate on.  Paul was convinced and we should be too that these things should be considered and the God of peace will be with us if we do meditate upon these.  Man's imagination and thoughts of his heart have gotten him in trouble many times.  Genesis 6:5 reveals that this is what God saw when He made a decision to destroy the earth by a flood.  II Corinthians 10:5 warns us to bring our every thought into captivity or under control to the obedience of Christ.  We must concentrate on developing a spiritual vocabulary, speaking words of edification and instruction instead of words of hate, jealousy and bitterness (Eph. 4:29).

We need nourishment for our souls and the best way to gain this nourishment is to feed our mind with the word of God.  This will allow one to produce patience and comfort while giving hope in this world of darkness.  We have fallen victim to the notion that we do not have time for Bible Study and that it is hard to understand so there is no need to study comething I can't understand anyway.  Why would we think that God would give us a perfect law of liberty (James 1:25) and require us to follow it yet make it where we couldn't understand it?  Many miss nourshing their soul with the word of God because they do not spend the time in meditating and studying His word as they should.

How am I promoting love among my fellow brethren?  I Peter 1:22 teaches us that God commands us to love one another fervently with a pure heart.  Love is a Christ like characteristic that should be found in all of us.  I Thessalonians 3:12-13 states that we should increase and abound in our love one to another.  This is an area that all can improve in.  Do I earnestly strive to promote love and good will among the brethren?

We should strive to become better stewards of our money.  Ephesians 4:28 instructs us to work with our hands so that we may give to others who are in need.  Often, it is throught poor stewardship of our money that we barely have enough to make ends meet, much less, have extra that we can help those in need with.  Sometimes we become like those in Luke 8:14 where we find the word of God falling among some who when they hear His word go out and become choked with the cares, riches and pleasures of life and bring no fruit to maturity.  It is very easy to fall victim to the god of credit where we end up paying our tribute in interest that hinders our ability to serve the Lord as we should.

Yes, I can improve and no doubt all who honestly answered the question at the start of this article can say they can improve also.  Now, if we will “just do it”.